


Retreat is Impossible

by whopooh



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, It seems I did one more for the trope, MFMM Year of Tropes, the paradox of pursuing a modern woman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-19
Updated: 2017-05-21
Packaged: 2018-11-02 15:53:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10947771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whopooh/pseuds/whopooh
Summary: After a successful case, Jack does the unimaginable thing and gives in to his desire for Phryne.For the May trope hurt/comfort. Set in the second half of Season 2 of MFMM.





	1. Chapter 1

They were walking up her garden path outside Wardlow, heading for their customary nightcap and perhaps a small flirtation, when it happened. 

Jack had taken Phryne home after a successfully concluded case, a case that had included both wall-scaling and a well-placed use of her French skills. She kept her hand nestled around his bicep as he escorted her to the door. Phryne had been a bit giddy with how she had managed to work out the case: her brain had been on fire and made extra brilliant connections, her wall-scaling had been both daring and fun, and the stars were out in the warm and breezy night. 

Everything about the evening seemed almost magic. Jack had been a perfect gentleman – of course – and she had thoroughly enjoyed their sparring. She turned to him. Maybe he was also caught up by the magical feeling of the day; his steady gaze seemed to be a little bit different than usual as she quipped one of her innuendos to him, smiling one of her smiles that were also a dare.

Then it happened. 

Phryne came to her senses eventually, but not until they had kissed for a shockingly long time. She had been lost in the warmth and the softness and the insistence of his mouth as he had leaned down to her, his hand in her hair caressing her neck gently, his eyes closed. How had this even happened? 

He _hadn’t_ made his usual retreat when she had tilted her head and flirted suggestively with him. She had expected him to give her that stern, questioning look in response and then brush her flirtations away. As he always had. That’s what he did, who he was – the man who resisted her. She couldn’t even count the times she had said something with intent and he’d deflected it. Why hadn’t he now? This time, he had stayed put, gazed at her, and then broken the tension by kissing her. 

Kissing her! Yes, it was a delicious kiss and yes, it made her toes curl, but it was preposterous! He was a man of honour! He would never do such a thing as succumb to a woman’s attempt to flirt and rile him up. He was a pillar – he had perfected the art of leaning because he was always thoroughly grounded in what was right and proper, and that… that was what she counted on. She had come to count on Jack to do the right thing, to resist her, to jokingly lock eyes with her but to not take any of her suggestions seriously.

And then he had. 

Oh, this was a mess.

She had always found him enticing and endearing, and that was of course why she had flirted with him in the first place. If he had said yes in the beginning, she would have gladly taken him to bed. And as time went by, she would certainly have done it if he’d allowed it – there had been times when she had dreamed about it, fantasized about how it would be: if he would be as intense in bed as he was when he gazed at her over a glass of whisky, and as meticulous in touching her as when he worked a case.

But something had changed, and she hadn’t even realised it. The man she had used to hope would give up his boundaries, she had instead started to admire because of them. She flirted with him, she teased him relentlessly, but somewhere along the way she had stopped wanting him to succumb. 

She _wanted_ him to put up his large signs, clearly stating “here but no further,” and she loved him for having those boundaries. Yes, she did love him, but precisely because he wouldn’t let her have him. 

And now, suddenly, he had erased all the fences and allowed her to trespass – no, rather invited her in to invade. As much as Phryne appreciated the way he’d devoured her, she didn’t like the fact that he had.

She had closed her eyes as they kissed, she had dived into the feeling of him; soft lips, lingering scent, the decisive presence of his body as he lightly pressed her to him. She had put her hand on his waist. As he opened his mouth to her, to invite her in and to intoxicate himself on her tongue, he had made the most delicious groan of pent-up desire. She kissed him back, rather enthusiastically – she couldn’t deny it. Mostly because he had caught her by surprise. She hadn’t been ready for him to actually take her bait. She didn’t know how to process the possibility of a Jack that gave up his ideas of boundaries and dignity… for her.

She knew she ought to smile suggestively and say to him “At last, Inspector” and invite him upstairs, inhabiting the prescribed role of Phryne Fisher. But she couldn’t. When they stopped kissing to catch their breaths, Jack pressed his forehead to hers and said – softly, jokingly, sweetly – “I give in”. He smiled a small smile while saying it, but it still made Phryne flinch.

She withdrew.

“No, Jack,” she said. “I cannot do this. It’s…”

She disengaged from his embrace and turned to walk to her door. She saw Jack was struck dumb, not understanding what had gone wrong.

“I’m sorry Jack, I…” she said vaguely, then collected herself. “Good night, Inspector.” She disappeared through the door. 

Jack stood there, his arms still half-gripping after a figure that had already disappeared. In the hallway, Phryne leaned back against the closed door, gasping. What had they done? What had _she_ done? How could this have happened?


	2. Chapter 2

It had been a spur of the moment, but it had also been a long time coming. When Jack had taken Phryne out for a stake-out this evening, everything had felt so _right_. They laughed. He adored her courage and her wit, and suddenly he was caught by the feeling that _this was it_. If he wouldn’t kiss her now, then when? He had never met a woman he had wanted to kiss more than Phryne Fisher in his life. Perhaps it was the wonderful night or the success of the case, but this night, his mind didn’t stop him.

Sod propriety, sod all his reservations – he desperately wanted to kiss this enticing woman, and if he knew anything at all, it was that she wanted to kiss him too. She had made that clear, again and again. Jack had been married and knew something about intimacy, and the level of intimacy he shared with Phryne was quite astounding. _Why not?_ he thought. He was enamoured and lightheaded, and the night was beautiful.

He guessed he would have done anything for her in that moment.

Anything, except managing to understand what happened.

As he saw the door to Wardlow slide shut behind her, he felt numb. Silently standing in her front garden, he willed the door to magically open again. After a moment, he remembered to close the mouth that had stayed open in disbelief. After another moment, he straightened his body and remembered how to use his feet, walking back to his car. A part of him wanted to rush up to the door and knock and demand a reason for her cruelty, but he wasn’t that man. He wasn’t a man who demanded attention when a woman clearly didn’t want to give it to him. Clearly didn’t want him.

He sat in his car for a while, tracing with his fingers the lips that had so recently been pressed to hers, trying to relive the moment to find where he’d gone wrong. Then he started the car and drove back to Richmond. He pulled out his whisky and sat in his favourite chair for a long time, staring at nothing. 

He had put his heart out for her, and she had rejected it. He didn’t get much sleep that night. 

 

***

 

The next time he saw her was at a crime scene in Hawthorn. Three days had passed without any contact between them. The ambulance was just driving away with the victim’s body and Jack and Hugh stood outside the block of flats where the murder had happened. It was entirely unsurprising that Phryne chose that moment to stop her car at the side of the street and clamber out of it, immaculately dressed and with a smile on her face. His heart sank.

“Hello Jack!” she said cheerfully. 

Her pitch was suspiciously high. She seemed to have gone for the option “pretend as if nothing had happened,” then. Well, he could see the appeal.

“Miss Fisher,” he all but growled. “Don’t you have anywhere else you need to be but at my crime scenes?”

He regretted it instantly; that level of grumpiness didn’t particularly suit him. She looked taken aback for a moment, but quickly masked it as mock surprise.

“Not that I know of, no. Do you have any suggestions?” she answered and swiftly passed him into the house to speak with the bereaved wife, who turned out to be the sister of one of her friends from the Adventuress’ Club.

He watched her retreating back and wondered if he ought to apologise; that really was uncalled for. But the briskness of her steps dissuaded him. If she pretended everything was fine, why shouldn’t he just let her? 

As they worked the case, there were moments when he forgot he was supposed to be cold towards her, when they were almost back to normal. But as soon as they were, he was reminded of why he found her so alluring, and backed off again. Politely, he listened to her clues and shared his own thoughts. He knew better than to try to stop her from investigating – that was a lesson he had learned after trying to cut her off once before, after the Gertie Haynes case – but he didn’t have to _enjoy_ it. 

A few hours later in the morgue, as Mac had gone out to check a detail with a colleague, they had their first time alone in three days. Phryne assessed him with a raised eyebrow. Jack tried to look anywhere but at her.

“Jack,” she said. “Jack, you’re like a halibut on ice.”

He pondered her comment for a moment.

“Please don’t try to warm me up, Miss Fisher,” he finally answered. “Lukewarm fish just smells.”

She looked at him with a small smile.

“That’s one of the strangest extended metaphors I’ve ever heard, Jack,” she said, and he couldn’t help but shoot her an embarrassed smile.

“Don’t quote me on that,” he answered, then he straightened and turned formal again. “Though the sentiment still stands.”

Phryne took a deep breath and came to stand decisively in front of him, hands on hips.

“You can just say it, you know. Get it off your chest,” she challenged.

“Get what off my chest?”

“That I’m a horrible woman. That I’m a flighty tease who has played with your feelings, and that the old masters knew woman’s fickle nature well when they wrote the classic operas,” she said, dispassionately.

His eyes widened.

“Why would I say that?” he asked.

“Because you’re thinking it.”

The accusations had crossed his mind, offering a way out of his miserable state, but even deep in the arms of whisky he’d not been able to believe them.

“I’m not,” he said, then continued, exasperated: “Well, at least not most of it.”

“What are you thinking then, Jack?” she said, her eyes prodding his fiercely, not ready to step down from her challenge. 

“That I’d rather not have this conversation,” he said and looked at the door, hoping for Doctor Macmillan to materialise.

“Well, you are having this conversation, Inspector,” she said a bit tersely. Then her stance turned softer. “You do understand why I did what I did, don’t you?” 

“What do you mean understand? How could I not understand?” he said, not caring that the hurt could so easily be heard in his voice. “I recognise a rejection when I see it.”

“So you don’t understand, then,” she said. 

Her condescending words triggered his annoyance, even if her tone wasn’t haughty, but rather melancholic. He felt flustered, unsettled, and the morgue was so small he couldn’t get away from her, or even pace properly.

“I doubt there is more to understand than what I managed to grasp,” he finally answered, his tone short.

Phryne sized him up with those piercing blue eyes he usually treasured to get lost in, and that he now couldn’t read at all. 

“You think I’m cruel, don’t you?”

Jack shook his head, although perhaps not in a completely convincing way. Phryne moved toward him and put a hand on his chest, meeting his eyes. 

“I do love you, Jack. I do,” she said, simply, a soft note creeping into her voice. His heart started to beat faster, dread and hope and vexation combatting in his gut. “It’s just, I respect you more. I cannot watch you give in and compromise yourself for a woman with loose morals.”

Jack, who had steadily looked her in the eyes, flinched at her last statement.

“How can you –?” he said, but she interrupted him:

“Isn’t that what they’d call it, the friends of Aunt Prudence? Your superiors on the force?” Her voice was flat, detached. “For the purposes of this conversation, my morals are loose indeed.”

“I don’t –” he started, but she seemed determined not to let him finish his sentences. 

“But I cannot change myself either.”

“That’s…that’s…” he fumbled for words, his face turning a little red. He wanted to tell her he didn’t want to change her, that his view was the same as the last time they had has this conversation, in her parlour, when he’d tried to cut himself off from her. “That’s the worst excuse I’ve ever heard!” was all he managed to blurt out. Then he steadied himself. “I’m a grown man, Miss Fisher. I don’t need you to protect me from you.”

Before she had time to retort, Doctor Macmillan entered the room, overhearing the last comment. She shot them a curious and slightly weary glance as they stood there, Phryne’s hand still planted on Jack’s chest.

“Apologies for interrupting, but perhaps you would like to hear about our findings?” she asked.

 

***

 

“How can you love me and not want to be with me? Isn’t love supposed to conquer all?” 

He would never say anything as sloppy to her in person, but it felt better to say it aloud, so he posed his questions to the whisky glass as he sat drinking in his living room. He hadn’t gone to Wardlow for a nightcap after this case, instead he had decided on a sad, solitary one. _Just the way he had used to before meeting her._

“What does it even mean, when you say you love me?” he pondered.

He wanted to feel betrayed and angry, he wanted to rage, he wanted to hate her and wail about his own feelings. But there was something about Phryne Fisher that just made that impossible. He tried once again to call her mysterious, callous, fickle, or fatal in his mind, but it didn’t work. He sighed as he put down his glass. The truth was, she was none of those things. She was not fickle or callous. Her loyalty was, when earnt, absolute. And her loyalty to herself, to the way she desired to live her life, was the most absolute of all.

When he cut his ties with her the last time, it was because he wanted to protect himself from his feelings. This time, he had accepted them instead, and decided to surrender and go where they lead him. And then she decided to protect him from their consequences. The absurdity of this made him snort whiskey up his nose, and it burned rather harshly. _Suits me right for wallowing._

“She might love you, but _no more than reason_ ,” his glass quoted to him. Yes, Jack had a suspicion about what it meant. In another world, in another time, in other circumstances, she might have loved him, wholeheartedly. 

“You do realise it’s actually a compliment that she doesn’t want to fuck you?” his whisky glass answered him. He was rather glad for the bluntness of his imagined conversation partner.

“Worst compliment ever,” he responded sullenly. 

“She respects your position and your view of commitment. She might not be the marrying kind, but she doesn’t play with people who crave stability.”

“Must you be so logical?” he complained to his imaginary friend. “I don’t want to change her. I doubt that I could change myself. Why is there no way to a happy ending here?”

It seemed the whisky glass had no answers to that, so Jack drained it and shuffled off to bed instead.


	3. Chapter 3

Phryne was surprised that Jack came to Wardlow shortly after lunch the next day. He hadn’t come over for a nightcap after the case was finished, and after their stand-off in the morgue, she had surmised he wanted to keep to himself. That he perhaps didn’t even want to see her.

“The Inspector to see you,” Mr Butler announced after having taken care of his hat and coat. Phryne put down the book she was reading and eyed him. He looked a little lost as he stood in the doorway to her parlour, as if he wasn’t sure he ought to be there at all.

“Come in, Jack,” she said, with a soft and slightly questioning tone.

She watched him nod and carefully choose a seat in one of the chairs. He studied his own hands, then he finally looked at her. 

“Miss Fisher,” he started, with a voice that was almost steady. “I just wanted to say, in case I hadn’t made it clear already, that I respect your decision and think you are probably right.” 

When she met his gaze, she got the feeling he had locked all his sadness in a box and decided to hide it away. She could sense his subdued emotions as if they were a presence in the room. Phryne wasn’t a stranger to that kind of locking in herself, of course, but this was at a whole other level. Seeing his wide and expressive eyes, she fought down the urge to walk over to him and plant herself in his lap. Her body seemed to just want to relive that kiss that she had managed to extract herself from. 

“I realise our view of things are impossible to combine, even if I wish that wasn’t the case,” he continued.

She was impressed by his sensibility, and by his decision to not try to chase a person that didn’t want to be caught.

“I know I cannot make you love me,” he continued, “or choose to be with me – however much I might wish it. That… that would be preposterous.” He was collected and firm, clearly trying to be his most unsentimental.

“I have sworn to live a life free of constrictions,” Phryne answered. “To not become anyone’s possession and to live my life to the hilt.”

“And you do it admirably,” he said with a lopsided smile. It made her think of her birthday party last year, when he had come to her to get the statement about Foyle signed. He had had the same look on his face then, as he’d told her that he saw how she lived her life fully; the same soft eyes and small smile.

“And I cannot see you doing anything in this area lightly,” she said.

He produced a small nod. 

“I appreciate you telling me about your feelings for me,” he continued, “even if I would have led an easier life knowing nothing about them.” He made a pause, struggling. “But I promise I won’t disappear on you again.”

Phryne felt a gust of warmth travel through her body. She wasn’t going to lose him in some repetition of the time he thought her dead in a car crash. For all the mistake of that late-night kiss, he would still be there in her life, as her friend and partner. Everything would be alright. She met his intense eyes, and it was like receiving an electric bolt through her body. She smiled, her eyes turning suspiciously wet. 

“Thank you,” she said quietly.

He nodded and rose to leave; she followed him to the hall, watching him put on coat and hat. He looked up, meeting her eyes again.

“Until our next murder investigation, Miss Fisher,” he said. Then he was out the door.

 

***

 

A week later – or nine days to be exact, and he couldn’t help being exact – Jack was sitting in his office going through a case file, inwardly marvelling at how he managed to focus despite his broken heart. He felt a perverted kind of pride in how he kept himself together and worked like normal. _He could do this._ Well, almost like normal, at least – the poor constable who had met his anger at a minor mistake yesterday might have been less inclined to think so. 

Jack tried not to think about anything else than his job. If he acted normal, eventually, that would become the truth. He had seen Phryne twice, very shortly, on their new case. It had been manageable; they had shared clues and he had only been a little bit slower and more distracted than usual. He huffed out a private laugh. Who was he kidding? Collins had thrown him a pitying glance and asked if he was alright, and if Collins picked up on it, he couldn’t have been very subtle.

He sighed. Still, it had only been a week. He meant what he said, he wouldn’t cut her off a second time. He’d just have to carry on when seeing her and wallow when he was alone.

He hadn’t more than thought the word ‘alone’ when there was a knock on his door. In came a Miss Fisher in red and white and a slight fluster, her beauty and energy an onslaught to his sensibilities. She hesitated in the doorway, shooting a curious glance his way, before deciding to invade his office space properly.

“Jack! Do you have a minute?”

Suppressing a wish to say that he was far too busy, he just sighed and laid down his pen on the desk. 

“Of course, Miss Fisher. What can I do for you?”

She eyed him, seemingly to determine his mood. He wondered if Collins might have let slip something about his poor behaviour the other day. Phryne seemed to debate where she should sit down, only to conclude she needed to take up her usual spot – aiming herself to the corner of the desk, very close to him. The intimacy of it almost made him choke.

He studiously avoided her gaze, just to finally give in and look at her. She had a tiny smile and the softest eyes, and as he caught his breath he felt that nothing of this was particularly fair.

“I was out all night yesterday. And the night before that. Dancing,” Phryne said.

He had a reasonable idea what Phryne Fisher being out dancing meant, and answered dryly:

“I’m sure your dance partners were thrilled.”

She looked at him.

“I am a rather slow person, you know.”

He quirked an eyebrow at her, rather successfully despite her being far too close for comfort.

“You have one of the quickest minds I know.”

“Not always, Inspector.” She rolled her eyes. “Sometimes I am very slow. I had even taken him to my boudoir. He was an excellent kisser.”

He made a harrumph. Yes, he had promised to not disappear on her, to be there for her, but this was ridiculous!

“It wasn’t… It wasn’t until I undressed him.”

Jack flicked his eyes away. “Is it really… I am rather…” he tried, but Phryne persisted.

“It wasn’t until I undid his tie, that it struck me.”

He didn’t say a word, looking at her from the depths of his office chair, but his eyebrows clearly asked her “Why are you telling me this?”

“I didn’t want to take it off. I didn’t care for it. It didn’t _mean_ anything.” She paused. “And it seemed I wanted it to mean something.” 

He threw her an exasperated look – what nonsense was this? – just to flinch when she reached out her hand and put it on his chest, next to his tie. She took hold of it and pulled it slowly out of his vest, caressing it from top to bottom, obviously taking pleasure in its silkiness, while not taking her eyes away from his for a moment. Finally, she took hold of it more decisively, using it to drag him closer. He was too mesmerised by the sight of her to protest when she let go of the tie and buried her hands in his hair to kiss him fiercely. 

There was no way Jack could do anything but respond to that kiss. She overwhelmed his senses and seemed to unlock everything he had tried to suppress. As she buried her tongue in his mouth, he somehow managed to take hold of her waist and pull her into his lap, where she got an even better angle for that new enterprise of devouring him. He kissed her back, not letting the small sceptical voice in his mind do any talking, just feeling her hair, her skin, her mouth, her tongue, the weight of her on his lap. This was how it had felt that ominous night when he had kissed her outside Wardlow, just even more so. He felt like he was on fire, every part of his body only existing to react to the actions of the woman in his arms. Phryne’s hands moved over him, letting go of his hair to caress his cheek, his shoulders, his chest, every movement making him kiss her even harder. He felt utterly dishevelled. It wasn’t until her fingers found his tie again that he started to retreat.

“Wait,” he said, with hardly enough breath to even get that short word out. “What –”

“There is only one tie I truly want to untie, Jack,” she interrupted him. “I hadn’t realized my tie interest had become so single-minded.” His tie was now undone and hanging over his neck, and she pulled it so it slowly glided away, then threw it over her back onto his desk. “Because I want what is underneath it.”

He swallowed.

“You do?”

“You are far too much of a gentleman for your own good, Inspector Robinson. Accepting my dismissal so easily. But it’s too late, Jack. Retreat is impossible.”

She leaned down to kiss him again, but he put up his hand to stop her. He saw her eyes turn heated from his gesture of censure, something he would have to think about when he was alone.

“But all the other problems? You proved how it would never be possible–.” She interrupted him again, taking the hand he had stopped her with and planting it back on her waist, then pressing her lips quickly against his. 

“I realised that as much as I don’t want to be anyone’s possession… I don’t mind belonging. And you never try to own me, Jack. That is a wonderful trait in a man.”

She again nestled a hand in his hair, obviously enjoying the feeling of releasing his subdued locks, and gave him a small smile that made his heart constrict.

“I do love nothing in the world so well as you. Is that not strange?”

He searched her eyes, to see if she really meant what she said. 

“As strange as the things I know not,” he retorted easily, then hesitated again. “I… don’t know what to say, Miss Fisher.”

“Then don’t,” she said, gasping as he decided to push his hand under her partly hitched up dress to caress her back. “Isn’t the world full of compromises?” she continued, unbuttoning the top buttons of his shirt and vest, kissing the throat thus unveiled. 

Then she leaned to the side and whispered in his ear: “Just never ever think of it as giving in.” Jack took her cheek in his hand to make her meet his eyes again, and answered quietly: "Just as long as you don't think that either." 

 

***

 

Constable Collins popped his head into the Inspector’s office to ask if his superior wanted to join him for lunch. Before he had the chance to say anything, he caught sight of one rather dishevelled Phryne Fisher, sitting in the lap of the Inspector and kissing him so thoroughly it made Hugh’s cheeks burn red. That frenzy, and the response it received, told him the Inspector was probably not that desperate for a pie from the pie cart just now. 

Hugh closed the door quietly behind him, and went about his own business. It seemed life at the station would become even more interesting in the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The quotes are from "Much ado about nothing", a play that is such a treasure for the relationship between Phryne and Jack.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you Fire_Sign for reading and being a soundingboard!


End file.
